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Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, the Quaker Christian leader William Penn made a peace treaty with the Delaware Indians on JUNE 23, 1683.

Along the Delaware River, Indians called themselves ‘Lenape’ (meaning in Algonquin ‘the people’) and consisted of three clans: Turkey, Wolf, and Turtle.

Lenape ‘Turtle’ clan Chief Tamanend met with William Penn, who they called ‘Miquon’ meaning quill, under an elm tree in what became Philadelphia and made a peace treaty which lasted over 70 years.

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In 1697, Tamanend’s last message before he died was:

“We and Christians of this river have always had a free roadway to one another, and though sometimes a tree has fallen cross the road, yet we have removed it again and kept the path clear.”

Chief Tamanend was a native American held in such high respect that patriotic Americans in Philadelphia formed Tammany Societies, which later became the namesake of Tammany Hall, the New York Democrat political machine founded in 1786.

Unfortunately pulled into larger conflicts, the Lenape ‘Turkey’ clan sided with the French during the French & Indian War (1754-1763) and attacked English settlers.

During the Revolutionary War, ‘Turtle’ clan Chief Gelelemend signed the first written Indian treaty ever with the U.S. Government in 1778, the Treaty of Fort Pitt, in present-day Pittsburgh.

Chief Gelelemend later converted to Christianity through the ministry of German Moravian missionaries.

Moravian missionaries came from Monrovia, Saxony, and Bohemia–present day Czech Republic–growing out of the followers of John Hus.

In 1722, from the estate of Count Nikolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf, the small Moravian congregation sent out hundreds of Christian missionaries around the world: to the Arctic, Africa, the Far East, South America and North America, and the Caribbean, being the first Protestant denomination to minister to slaves.

Moravian missionaries first settled in Savannah, Georgia, in 1735.

They settled Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, in 1740, and Winston-Salem, North Carolina, in 1752.

Moravians founded missions with the Mohican Indians in New York, the Cherokee in Georgia, and the Lenape in Pennsylvania.

The Lenape ‘Wolf’ clan converted to Christianity, being called Christian Munsee, but were mistaken for hostile Indians–and many were tragically killed by vigilantes in 1782.

The Lenape fled to Canada, then some moved to Kansas and finally to Oklahoma.

In 1861, the great-grandson of Chief Gelelemend was born, being named John Henry Killbuck.

John Henry Killbuck attended the Moravian Seminary and, in 1884, became one of the first Christian missionaries to the Yupik Indians in Alaska.